Case Study: State of South Carolina Office of First Steps

State of South Carolina Office of First Steps

Fiscal accountability and contract monitoring system for South Carolina’s “First Steps” school readiness program.

South Carolina’s then-Governor Jim Hodges wanted to initiate a statewide, county-based program
to prepare young, at-risk children for school in an effort to increase the state’s competitiveness. While
early childhood development programs made sense in theory, the governor was concerned about
how to achieve effective implementation of the programs while making the most efficient use of the
programs’ public and private funding.

PCG Human Services™ set out to create an accountability system that could ensure proper stewardship of the funding while at the same time creating efficiency and data sets that could be used to measure return on investment and relative value. PCG Human Services developed an accountability system in which all spending was related to an outcome and a research-based model program. This design allowed the state to track and monitor the county system while at the same time setting the stage for proper evaluation of the models.

PCG Human Services used its deep expertise in operations management consulting to provide South Carolina with a number of systems and services to ensure efficient operation of the First Steps programs, including:

• Development of all required financial and accounting definitions for First Steps, such as
  those governing in-kind expenditures, allowable capital expenditures, etc.
• A procurement evaluation guide to help counties procure services locally.
• Management of three statewide procurements, including 1) an accounting software
  system, 2) employee benefits for all First Steps staff, and 3) selection of corporations to
  serve as regional finance and accounting managers.
• Development of a cash management system to allow the state First Steps office to
  manage allocations to county partnerships.
• Monthly training sessions to educate local partnerships on use of fiscal accounting system
  forms and databases.
• A coding system to allow program data to be matched against fiscal data in order to
  allow measurement of outcomes, including cost benefit analysis.
• Individual consulting to counties, as needed, to develop implementation work plans and
  small business development assistance.